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User blog:Babyjabba/Mad Men Taking Over Office Culture
Modern business...Mad Men Style? There seems to be an endless stream of things that are getting Mad Menized...From fashion to parties, America is in love with Mad Men and HubSpot (a web based company) is one of the first companies to proclaim that their business practices are influenced by Mad Men! "At the highest level, we are trying to create a "post-modern culture." Believe it or not, this post-modern culture was inspired by the TV show Mad Men. The show is set in an advertising company 50 years ago and it pokes fun at corporate culture in that era. For example, almost all of the women in the office are secretaries, many of the married men are sleeping with these secretaries, everyone boozes heavily during work hours, etc. While watching Mad Men, I couldn’t help but wonder what a show might look like 50 years from today that poked fun at current working conditions and company culture. That led us to think a bit about what just didn’t make sense anymore given the realities of the Gen Y worker, broadband in the home, constant connectivity via mobile devices, the modern market for hiring exceptional people, etc." Read the full article at OnStartups.com Some of the highlights of their "new" look on office culture are: *“We don’t care which 80 hours you work”: People used to ask us about working unusual hours or working part of the day at home and Dharmesh and I used to always say, “We don’t care which 80 hours a week you work, so long as you put in your 80.” *No door policy: Many companies have an “open door policy,” but we have a “no door policy.” We all sit out in the open next to each other. I am currently writing this article wedged between two developers, Michael and Andrew, whose work I’ve gotten to know quite well when I otherwise would have been out of touch in a corner office. *Seat rotation: I have been sitting next to Andrew and Michael for about two months, but we are about to do one of our quarterly seat rotations where we pull numbers from a hat to see who we will be sitting next to. This ensures folks get to know different people from around the company. *Free beer: I can’t remember how it got started, but we always have free beer in our fridge. We are up to about 170 people and I’ve yet to see someone do something stupid. *No dress code: Doesn’t make sense to me to tell people what to wear…we’re not in a boarding school -- we are in a company where we want people to be as productive as possible. What do you think Maddicts? Do you wish your company was more open minded and took a cue from Mad Men? Or do you think this guy is full of it? A lot of these ideas aren't exactly new but can work wonders for certain types of companies... Source: On Startups Category:Blog posts